Schachmann wins at Prato Nevoso; Yates loses time but stays in pink
Maximilian Schachmann leads the 12-rider breakaway during stage 18 from Abbiategrasso to Prato Nevoso at the Giro d'Italia (Image credit: Tim de Waele/TDWSport.com)
Maximilian Schachmann (Quick-Step Floors) won stage 18 on the summit of Prato Nevoso on Thursday. The German was part of the day's breakaway that survived the final climb, and he held off Ruben Plaza (Israel Cycling Academy), who finished second, and Mattia Cattaneo (Androni Giocattoli-Sidermec), who was third.
The winning trio stemmed from the early breakaway that also included Quick-Step's Michael Morkov, Davide Ballerini, Christoph Pfingsten (Bora-Hansgrohe), Vyacheslav Kuznetsov (Katusha-Alpecin), Jos van Emden, Boy van Poppel (Trek-Segafredo), Marco Marcato (UAE Emirates), Giuseppe Fonzi and Alex Turrin (Wilier Triestina-Selle Italia). They built a lead of more than 16 minutes.
The remaining trio attacked each other beginning at 900m to the finish line, and Schachmann made his winning move with 300 metres to the line, leaving his two rivals to settle for second and third.
The battle for the GC heated up as well, and although Simon Yates (Mitchelton-Scott) is still in the maglia rosa, he lost 28 seconds to rival Tom Dumoulin (Sunweb). Yates now leads the race by 28 seconds ahead of Dumoulin, and 2:43 to third placed Domenico Pozzovivo (Bahrain-Merida). Chris Froome (Team Sky) is in fourth at 3:22 back.
There are three stages left of this Giro d'Italia with significant climbs on stage 19 to Bardonecchia and stage 20 to Cervinia, before the race wraps up in Rome in Sunday.
Watch how stage 18 unfolded in the highlights video above.
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